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bisonrav

bisonrav

An uneventful B2B to Jersey to round off the sequence, and I realise ruefully that I'm almost done with J sectors this year (just one to come). Bit more flying but it's all dribs and drabs. Goodbye Castelnau.

bisonrav

...and hello Cava.

Instead of booking throwaway trips for the Iberia 90,000 avios promo, I set up a few little circuits of Spain, and I did one of them today. Nice exercise in how (sort of) the other 95% live as it's all in the back.

First flight was BA however, at stupid o'clock from Gatwick, with a flight out to Seville. Momentary excitement at the gate as the magic beep went off with "seating error", but just as I was about to whoop at the upgrade it turned out I'd been moved from 13C to 12D. I thought this was odd, as 13C is the rearmost of the wing exits and a good seat, but it turned out there had been an equipment change and they'd tracked me into an equivalent seat. So good outcome. Also had a very nice gold greeting, which earned me a cup of tea and couple of biscuits - really good to see the investment beginning to pay off. My seat companions were frequent holiday fliers (and spent more than my ticket had cost on BoB booze, but they were having a great time) so we had a lovely chat swapping tips and ideas. You don't get that in CE.

Seville airport is a proper dump. Smells of smoke everywhere despite being nominally non-smoking, you get the impression staff are smoking in corners. As a little data point, I was able to get through quite a busy immigration line, out and up to a not particularly well signposted departures area, through security, and back to the gate and I'd easily have been able to get back onto the return flight. Apart from that, the lounge is OK but the food isn't.

Boarding the flight to Madrid was a bit of a scrum, and a nice DYKWIA moment as a thick set british guy pushed his way to the front and asked in a loud voice what the point of priority boarding is when there were two lines feeding through. It turned out though that he wasn't priority boarding, or at least not in the top tier, so the gate agents seemed to enjoy holding him back while others went past. His entire body was quivering with rage and his face and neck were an alarming shade of magenta, but he got his own back by pushing through to the front of the queue on the airbridge. The funny thing was he only had a small handbag, so could have waltzed on whenever he wanted. Control issues I guess.

Anyway, quick flight, good crew, no acknowledgement of status but wasn't really expecting it. I did have a blocked middle seat though.

Then the new Dali lounge which I liked a lot. Three sections, a buffet and table area, a bar, and a seating area with another buffet. Pleased to report that Haagen Daas is still there, under a tin lid on the buffet. And the sandwiches are fresh rather than the sealed packets there used to be, a very nice pastrami style one, plus a salad bar. Very much enjoyed my time there, which is just as well as I have a few more trips there to go.

And home. The most significant event there was that the crew stowed a very large laptop in the locker above my seat just prior to take-off. And of course for once the contents of the overhead HAD shifted and DID land on me when I opened it to get my book a little later. So it hit me in the chest. But I did manage to instinctively catch it, rather to the relief of the owner in the window seat who had been reluctant to give it up in the first place. Otherwise just another blocked middle, another charming crew - Iberia express crew seem to be quite lively and on the ball - and home.

Next trip is Beirut on Friday I still can't quite believe I'm going to Beirut.

bisonrav

Just back from the trip to Beirut, which I've posted about to some extent elsewhere. But a very good trip.

In summary, return WT fare was Ł308. Reduced to Ł208 using the BA Ł100 off for 5000 avios. Price match voucher for Ł60, and 8664 avios via standard GCH allocation and double base promotion. 624 from Amex premium BA card. so a total of 9288 avios, less the 5000 for the promo around Ł43 worth. So fare netted out to just over Ł100, 70TP which I really don't need as I'm not going to try to stretch to 7000. And that was the basis I booked on, not really thinking about the destination apart from that it was an intriguing place to be able to go and a cheap weekend away. I remember it from my teens and early twenties as being a warzone, overrun by militias, so the idea of going there seemed a little bizarre and exciting.

En route I spent most of the Friday in the CCR, figuring that a breakfast, a few glasses of LPGS and a long lunch would wipe out most of the remainder of the ticket cost. I was joined by the travel by the excellent @estrangeiro8 who was great company throughout. Good flight out, low key gold greeting, a bit of sleep, and we took the agoda booked charlietaxi to the Radisson Blu without incident. I'd emailed them a few days prior to ensure they'd be waiting at arrivals, and they were.

First Beirut lesson was on waking early the next day: the cashpoints don't give you less than $US50 notes (and the airport ones don't work). Second lesson was that it's very very difficult to get change in $ - supermarkets don't do it. Hotels don't do it. Banks don't do it. They will take the note, but you get change in lira, as these aren't very useful outside the Lebanon the advice is to arrive with plenty of low denomination dollar notes.

I didn't bother to get a SIM - I just loaded google maps up in offline mode and used that to find my way around. We'd decided to go on the Alternative Beirut Tour on the recommendation of a previous visitor: this turned out to be the best decision of the weekend. On the way we had a manousheh - a sort of pizza style flatbread topped with herbs, which is delicious, and met the guide at the top of the redoutable St Nicolas steps. It was clear the group would be pretty big, 20-30 people in the end. The guide, a young and very easy on the eye young guy, Moustafa, introduced himself to us, had us introduce ourselves to each other, and set off a fair old pace to the first stop, which was a beautiful house set in elegant gardens.

And then he started explaining Beirut to us.

I'm not going to even try to start telling the stories - go and have the tour if you want to hear them, and believe me you should. But by the end of it, we were fascinated, sometimes amused, often deeply moved, and had a new insight into the culture and politics of the Lebanon and of Beirut itself. Moustafa proved to be literate, articulate, urbane, charming and funny, but with all of that deeply thoughtful, kind, and with a very liberal and international perspective. He didn't shrink from explaining the horrors of the civil war, but he coloured that with a deep sense of common humanity, and complete frankness and honesty. One of the most impressive human beings I've ever encountered, genuinely.

Because of the size of the group, the tour took much longer than usual, ending at around 4pm in a delightful communal space, I think called "the mansion" set up for artists and free thinkers to share ideas, to show films, and to eat and drink.

We stopped off on the way back to the hotel for another manousheh and got into conversation with another local, who owned the shop - complete with a wood burning oven which he was very proud of. Another articulate and charming man, very keen to show us the prices were fixed on his wall and we weren't going to be overcharged as tourists, and full of recommendations for places to go.

Beirut is a bit scruffy, and bears the scars of war physically and I suppose less visibly in the psychology of the people. Moustafa had explained that like many in the city, he finds the concept of making any plan longer term than a few months impossible to comprehend. But it has ineffable charm, and there are wonders around every corner. It captivates. Everyone we spoke to felt the same.

And then off to a restaurant for some dinner - I had a tremendous but stupendously oversized lamb couscous, and there we were at the end of the day. Now we had been planning to get up around 4.30am to get to the airport for an 8.30 flight, but the first officer rostered onto it was unfortunately taken ill, and a replacement flown out. Because of crew rest rules, the flight was delayed until 11am, and as BA sent a message out to this effect I was pleased to get an extra couple of hours in bed (my delight at this was tempered slightly later by seeing him, stretched out at the back of CW, grey and very ill looking indeed, poor guy). But anyway although there were plenty of queues (one security line to get to the check in, another for immigration (then a lounge stop), then another security check, then the gate where there were individual and nearly 100% pat downs and swab tests, none of the steps took any great time at all. There was a bit of food in the lounge, good coffee, nothing special. Oh, and Uber worked very well to get us to the airport for just over $10 and 15 minutes.

Greeted onboard by the same cabin crew we went out with, and another pleasant enough flight. Gold greetings low key on both legs, but they were done.

I will definitely be going back to Beirut. I had toyed with the idea of passing my extensive lira haul onto someone going next week, but decided to keep them for next time. It was the most enjoyable trip of the year by far.

A short pause for breath, and then off to the Scilly Isles on Wednesday, via a Flybe freebie from the credit card to Newquay and then the Skybus. Not BA related but adding to my flights tally.

bisonrav

Hesitate to post this as it's not really at all BA related, but all part of the flying year, and one of the more enjoyable trips too.

I don't share the optimism from some quarters regarding Flybe's resilience to market pressure, and I had a "free flight" from the credit card so I thought I'd better use it sharpish. There was a Ł28 tax return to Newquay from LGW so I booked, and then filled that in with a trip on the Skybus to the Scillies, as a B2B essentially though they allowed it on one ticket despite a very short connection time.

So off I went. Loungeless at LGW for this flight so hit the Grain Store instead, which incidentally takes Lounge pass though I didn't do that. Very efficient boarding process, nice flight. Nothing remotely wrong with Flybe, just that their positioning is incomprehensible and they're not low cost really.

There was enough time to take the 20 minute bus ride to Newquay proper, so I did that, wandered around and had a pasty and Costa. The demographic in Newquay off season makes Funchal look like club 18-30, but it's a nice little high street. Plenty of pasty options. At these times I always remember my Auntie Jean (from Par) and her pasties which were marvellous, but it was a cold day and a hot pasty went down a treat.

Back to the airport and checked in for the Skybus, handwritten boarding pass and all. The safety video is mercifully done straight and shown at the gate. There were about 6 of us, so plenty of room on the Twin Otter, with the first officer doing the boarding. And off we went.

It was just coming up to sunset, and a beautiful clear day. The views of the Cornish coastline were just gorgeous, very dramatic, and the islands themselves were similarly beautiful. Very very enjoyable. I spoke to the FO on the way out and asked her not to leave without me, and she thought the B2B was very amusing.

On landing it was off the flight, through into the arrivals area (about the size of a living room), round into departures, and to the one check in desk where you get handed a plastic boarding token. There is no security. Another safety video and onboard, this time the FO was flying so the captain did the steward duties. It was dark and there was some low cloud making turbulence so less enjoyable, but there was a full moon and we followed that back to Newquay. Through arrivals and into departures again, there is security at Newquay but it's very quick. And home again, another nice flight and plenty of room to stretch out.

I'll post a few photos of this trip in a minute from my phone. Definitely recommend it, though I'd probably arrange to spend some time on the Scillies were I doing it again.

bisonrav

bisonrav

We will all no doubt remember the 90,000 Iberia Avios promotion, during which many of us booked the 18Euro PMI to MAD fare?

Ever the contrarian, I believe I may be the only such soul to actually have flown one of them. Yesterday. Busy day though. I'd originally connected up to this starting with a flight from Gatwick to Barcelona. However BA cancelled the Gatwick service and put me on the 0745 from Heathrow instead, also offering a tempting POUG which I took. So I had to trog up to Heathrow on the train and tube - first time I've done this, with a network railcard it's very inexpensive but I prefer National Express to be honest - and stayed in the Premier Inn for Ł27 which was pretty good really.

And into the last premium cabin of the year. I have a few more jaunts this year, but all in the back. So I was hoping for a good one. Sadly it was very poor. A very uncommunicative CSM running the very small cabin. She doled out breakfasts before drinks, so there was nothing really to wash the food down with until she came through and served the drinks with a minimum of interaction. Then she went back to the galley, emerged to clear things away, no attempt at a proactive drinks service (bear in mind this is a relatively long flight), and sat on her jump seat reading a paperback. Not the slightest hint of recognition of status, no chat, nothing. Really poor service to the point where I was almost considering dropping a line of complaint.

The observant amongst you will note that Barcelona is not PMI. But I had a plan for this, which was to try Vueling out in a relatively short let from their home base where it was difficult to see anything much going wrong. This was to have been a full bare back experience, but I bottled it and bought an exit row seat, which also put me into group 1. However all did not run smoothly. The incoming plane from Italy arrived at the gate, but for some reason the airbridge didn't come across for well over an hour, it just sat there with the pilots opening the front window and hanging out, waving and shouting. Eventually a long stringy gaggle of extremely annoyed looking passengers came off. We were now late.

Boarding was good, the plane was maybe a third full. In the opposite exit row was an extremely drunk and gravel voiced Scot who was clearly in no state to operate the door. In front of him in the other exit row was his similarly drunk mate. He bought more beer right into the final ten minutes (which Vueling were quite happy to sell him, even though he put it on the floor during the final approach), and then insisted on singing "Your Song" very loudly on disembarkation in chorus with his mate. It was vaguely threatening and not really pleasant at all, though I suppose Palma is a party town.

The late arrival put paid to the plan to head to town, so I had a meal at the only American Steak House in the world that doesn't serve steak - burgers, ribs, etc, but no steak - before hunkering down in the Mediterraneo lounge. Which is the most brightly lit lounge I have ever been in, disconcertingly so. Thin pickings there, some cold meat, some rather dangerous looking pate, drinks (including Cava) and so on, and mostly deserted.

Then to the gate, fairly easy boarding process and I had the infinite leg room 12A on the A321. You get quite a bit of flight for your 18 euros, though I dozed through a lot of it.

I eschewed Uber (who had adverts all over the airport at Madrid) in favour of Cabify which has a very easy to find pick up point. Having said that they seem to be about double the Uber price, but anyway the service was quick and efficient, Ibis Madrid airport is extremely comfortable and had a free shuttle bus in the morning, I'll be using them again definitely.

And so to this morning where I breakfasted in the main T4 lounge. I'd been there a few weeks ago and noted that the afternoon food had improved, this unfortunately is not the case for breakfast. Where pretty much every Spanish lounge has Chorizo, salami, ham and cheese, all they had was cereal, bread, toast and jam. Very poor.

Onboard I had an exit row. Half way through boarding, one of the biggest guys I had ever seen on a flight squeezed unctuously past me into the window seat and flopped down. It was evident that even if he was able to free his arms enough to operate the door, he wouldn't have fitted through it. The Iberia cabin crew didn't appear to notice anything out of the ordinary, and he slept happily through the safety briefing. Really surprising this - he effectively put one of the 4 centre doors out of action during takeoff, and although this sounds almost comical it shouldn't have been allowed.

Anyway in the event it wasn't a problem and we made it back to Gatwick. Next flights next weekend also using Iberia tickets, this time going backwards and forwards to Madrid.

subject2load

bisonrav

More flying of Iberia 9000 avios flights this weekend, with identical trips on Saturday and Sunday to Madrid from Gatwick. Nothing very notable except to say I'm warming to Iberia Express. Not the slightest sniff of status awareness, but the crews were all dynamic and put a shift in, and having seat power is handy. 20 TPs to the good, a few Avios, and we're running fast towards the end of the year with the next trip next weekend being a family day out to Geneva.

bisonrav

We're nearing the end of the flying year, and with it this thread. I'm doing a few daytrips on the ludicrously low economy fares BA has been offering this year.

The first was to Geneva, in the expectation of seeing the escalade, with the wife and toddler. I do apologise to whoever it was sitting in front of the toddler, as he decided (in both directions) that the tray table should be opened and shut and opened and shut unless he decided it was time to open and shut and open and shut the blind. On the way back he threw a strop and howled a lot too. And then ran off through CE to the toilet to a chorus of harrumphing. I'm hoping his behaviour will improve, but it's not really his fault, he's a bronze

Anyway no great memories of the outbound, pleasant flight. Nice day in Geneva, except it was raining so we went to the National History Museum which is a bizarre concoction of tableaux of stuffed animals. Of course the boy loved it and it was very difficult to drag him away. We liked the Geneva lounge, he slept through quite a bit of that.

On the way back there was the curious incident I described in the DYKWIA thread, whereby two large and blingy people, a couple, decided to self upgrade. They were quickly sent back to their seats somewhere at the back. And then on landing, without even waiting for the seatbelt sign they came piling back through at a speed that would on the face of things seem improbable given their bulk, presumably in the hope of getting off first. Nearly flattening me, and then satisfyingly hitting the back of CE which brought them to a dead stop.

Gatwick provides very useful pushchairs, but the increasingly fractious bronze member of the party decided he didn't want to go in one. My patience wasn't optimum, and I bundled him in and held him in it, so he bawled and shouted insults loudly to the point where I thought I'd be stopped by an anti-child-trafficking swat squad. But in the event all was well.

Not a sniff of gold greeting, but it's a short flight and it wasn't expected.

So that was Saturday. Then this morning I set off again, this time to Venice - I now have going to Gatwick to take an early flight down to a fairly fine art. However on this occasion things went a little awry in the lounge. I chose the disabled toilet for what I can only really describe as going through the motions in privacy (one of the more difficult aspects of TP runs this). Unfortunately on standing up I accidentally pulled the alarm cord. Ear splitting noises ensued and there was no way I could find to turn the sodding thing off. So out I rushed, past a slightly concerned looking crowd of onlookers, to the reception area where I breathlessly explained what had happened. "Oh", she said, and I quote, "I was wondering what that flashing light was for."

Anyway onboard without fuss, and discovered the same CSM as the previous flight back from Geneva. Took my seat after a mutual doubletake, and settled down to enjoy two mini cokes and a back of kettle crisps that had somehow found their way into my bag. With about 40 minutes to go, she came up with her iPad, and did a full squat down gold greeting.... To a guy two rows forward and to my left. And then she repeated the greeting to another guy in the next row. They asked her for something and she came back with champagne for all. And then buggered off, just as I was expecting to be offered something myself.

I was livid, and mentally composing whatever the opposite of a golden ticket is. The ten minutes to go announcement came on. And all of a sudden she came back, introduced herself and said we had been on the same flight at the weekend, nice to see you again Mr Bisonrav, and rushed off to the back. And on the way back forward she stopped again and asked if I wanted anything to take off when I disembarked. I suspect there had been some checking of iPad going on. Anyway I forgave her. It doesn't take much to stroke your ego. I hate it when it happens, but I hate it more when it doesn't.

Fantastic day in Venice - big recommendation for this destination which I'd previously thought was likely to be a bit cliched. Caught a waterbus to town (tickets in the terminal, 15 euros or so for a ticket, trip takes about an hour). Was knocked out by the city - it helped that it was a glorious day and the sky was a flawless blue, but the light was something magical. I was struck a bit by the human tendency to take one of the most beautiful cities in the world and turn most of into shops selling absolute tat (niagra falls is quite similar in a lot of ways) but you can't spoil the majesty of this place. I had a lovely day, leaving at dusk on the number 5 Aerobus after a long walk along the Grand Canal (7 euros).

The Marco Polo lounge is excellent in Venice, lovely space and the food and drink is pretty good, certainly the best I've had in Italy. And homeward bound, with a very good Flight Attendant in the back, chatty and efficient, but a dithery CSM, despite only having 4 people in CE she didn't do any greetings. On landing I did a personal best of wheels down to trainseat of 15 minutes, I'm getting quite good at Gatwick.

And on Saturday the last trip of the year, a day trip to Malaga, and the end of the thread, with a few reflections on the year.

THEOBCMAN

Its been a very interesting journey to follow this year ! Do you plan to keep GGL (once expired) ? Or is it a case of mission accomplished & if it happens in future then so be it ?

BTW Malaga is lovely if you've never been ?!

bisonrav

3600 points already booked for next year, but unlikely to go beyond that to CCR - it's a nice perk but not worth the extra spend to retain.

megaloman

3500 tps for existing GGL is a sweet spot - you get all the GUFs, Jokers, partner cards, just not the CCR card.

bisonrav

So, to paraphrase T. S. Eliot, the year ends with a whimper, not a bang. On Thursday night I had a high temperature, felt reasonably recovered yesterday, and awoke at 5am this morning feeling fine. So I took the train to Gatwick, but about half way there my throat decided to catch fire. Proceeded anyway to the lounge - there was a queue behind a chancer who obviously had no access rights at all, but was claiming BA had sent him an invitation, then couldn't find it and asked the agent to find it for him and claiming this was the worst customer service ever. He was still arguing at least 5 minutes later.

Anyway grabbed a coffee and some paracetamol and sat down to decide what to do. Wasn't really very difficult in the end, I concluded that a long day in Malaga with a worsening cold wasn't advisable, and it was unfair to infect an entire flight just before Christmas, so I decided to abort the trip. It's an interesting process, you go to the information desk and they call someone to come and get you to take you out. Also there was a family of three who had been late to the gate and been denied boarding. They were very indignant as they'd then seen the flight was showing as slightly delayed, but were told that that was because their bag was being removed. Having managed to check a bag, I guess they lingered too long in a bar, but quite sad to see. They looked very glum as reality sank in,

You get led out of the airside via the staff passageways to the passport area, you have to be escorted through, and then through customs, and it took a while, particularly with the disgruntled family in tow as they felt it necessary to have an extended discussion at the transfer desk. But eventually out and home, and that's it for this thread really. I suppose I was due some sort of problem like this given the sheer quantity of flights I've been on, I've dodged a few bullets, most notably my back twinge in February, but at least this was a cheap fare and not significant for tier points.

Reflections? It's been a lot of fun. I've been to a lot of places, seen interesting things, met lovely people. It hasn't seemed like excessive flying; it's been concentrated in bursts mostly. If all works out as planned I'll be retaining GGL next year, though not CCR access which is an expensive bonus really. I'll hammer the access I have in 2019 anyway. It's been good to try out a lot of premium cabins and try different hard and soft products, but what I'm left with mostly is an affection for BA. For all its faults, it always feels a bit like home when you arrive onboard.